


Facing the Sun

by Aliens_against_the_patriarchy



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Domestic Fluff, Domesticity, Established Relationship, Flowers, Fluff, Keith gets lance sunflowers and Lance makes it weird, Keith is in LOVE babes, Language of Flowers, Love Languages, M/M, Pining Keith (Voltron), Pining Lance (Voltron), Post S8, Smitten Keith, girasol, klance, nobody dies in my VLD finale hey ho, smitten Lance, sunflowers are lance’s fave flower, this is like..... super fluffy, this is my first fic on here wowwie, title is because in my native language sunflower literally translates to ‘towards the sun’
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-17
Updated: 2019-01-17
Packaged: 2019-10-11 14:37:01
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,784
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17448893
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Aliens_against_the_patriarchy/pseuds/Aliens_against_the_patriarchy
Summary: Lance loves giving gifts; it’s one of his love languages, and it’s something he does better than anyone.But when it comes to receiving gifts...Or: Keith buys Lance an insane amount of sunflowers because they remind him of his favorite person in the whole world: his boyfriend.





	Facing the Sun

**Author's Note:**

> I haven’t posted a fic I’ve written since 2014... back when Fanfic.net was still a thing! Welp, I supposed there’s a first (second??) time for everything, so hey y’all!  
> I’ve been writing a KL piece for months and I hit a major writers block this last month, so I decided to try writing a small one shot to kick myself into the creative mindset once again; I did not intend to get so attached to this grotesquely fluffy one shot about Lance gettin the love he deserves, and yet here I am! Posting this!! 
> 
> I truly hope that you enjoy this fic- I tend to be a bit of a perfectionist with my writing, so thoughts and comments and such are not only welcome but vastly appreciated!! 
> 
> *DISCLAIMER* Personally, I disliked the direction season 8 ended up heading down. I found myself extremely hurt with Lance’s treatment, as I have NEVER felt more connected to a character in media as I have with him. That being said: the characters, the animation, the world building, and the concept VLD was able to bring to life were incredible and I do not speak negatively about it. Just a heads up in case anyone wants to comment about it!
> 
> Major major major MAJOR thank you to the coolest cool kid Imightbejehan for being my beta. Ace, you never cease to save the day!
> 
> Okay before I psyche myself out, here y’all go!

To say Lance liked giving gifts would be the understatement of the decaphoebe. 

He _loved_ gift giving, and everything about the art; the careful analysis of the personality and the shared friendship, the brainstorming sessions he would begin _weeks_ before any given occasion, the mall crawls, how sometimes he would find new stores he’d never seen before that become top of his revisit list; hole-in-the-wall antique shoppes with sets of hand-painted ornamental elephants of genuine amethyst, perfect for Coran’s ever growing collection of healing stones. Metaphysical bookstores so small that they do not appear on google searches and share building space with yarn and fabric businesses to cut rent, but house such an incredible supply of magical knowledge that he didn’t even know where to start looking for his best friend’s birthday gift, and decided to simply go back with Allura on her special day itself. 

And it doesn’t stop at birthdays, weddings, graduations…. No, Lance would find himself shuffling around his favorite family-owned record shop in mid August and leaving with a David Bowie CD just because he heard Keith singing one of the songs under his breath during an early morning that could have been days or weeks or months ago. Keith would look up to him as he’d set it down gently on their shared bed ( _shared!!! Lance STILL swoons at the s-word, months after their move_ ) just in front of him and between his legs, so that the CD case and the points of Keith’s crossed legs made a triangle. 

(“You bought the whole CD?”

“Mmhmm.” Lance would humm, putting one of his own knees on the bed and leaning heavily on his boyfriend’s shoulders. 

“How do you know I haven’t downloaded the album already?”

This would earn a snort from Lance, who would say, as he wraps his arms tightly around the broad shoulders of the man he loves-- and knows much too well, “You? Stream music? _From your phone?_ You barely know how to call me on that thing, Grandpa. As if.”

And Keith, never one to easily let Lance have the last word ( _MUCH_ to his disdain), would encircle his arms around the former blue paladin’s waist and haul him over himself, earning a squawk as they haphazardly drop onto the bed. 

Looking down at the love of his life, Lance would smile. Keith may have gotten a pretty sick CD, but he thinks he has the best gift of them all; right under him, looking up at him with those long, dark eyelashes and that dimple that appears on his right cheek when he smirks.

 _Mi tesoro_ , Lance would think to himself.

“Yeah,” Keith would say, brushing his nose ever so gently against Lance’s, removing one of his hands from the small of the other’s back to push the brown strands of hair out of Lance’s eyes.

“As if.”)

Yet, despite gifts being one of his love languages, Lance almost always finds himself caught off guard when placed at the receiving end of presents. 

That doesn’t go to say he never received them-- he hasn’t had a disappointing christmas or birthday yet-- but Lance knows that not everyone shows appreciation and love in the form of gifts. Hunk loves him in the way he cooks gallons of Lance’s favorite spicy rice and chicken soup during his visits-- enough to last he and Keith months of fuel for colds, flues, lazy dinners, and even bad days, when nothing seems to dull the phantom ache of the bomb that left a starburst scar on his back. When Keith would wake up shouting, reaching for the knife that no longer lay under his pillow ready to be unsheathed at any hint of danger. 

When the whole day is spent in silence, neither wanting to talk about their own demons, one of them would drag the comforter of their bed to the kitchenette, pull out one of the frozen quarts Hunk had labeled with a smiley face, and let a smile grow on their lips watching it revolve within the microwave.

Pidge loved by sharing her space, and lending you her time. If the clutterbug let you within five feet of her self-proclaimed “Holt Haven”-- aka, her penthouse research lab at the southwest border of the Nevada desert, you knew you were blood. Sometimes, when Lance would find himself missing their banter, he would simply video call his long-time friend and keep her company in silence as she went about her daily discoveries. Once in a while, they’d exchange commentary, but Lance knew how busy of a bee-- or bird-- Pidge really was. It meant the world to him how she would almost always answer within the third ring. 

Allura loved with her healing hugs, and her gentle way of grounding those she comforts with her gestures; when Lance came to her stressed, she would allow him to ramble about what it was that bothered him that day, playing with his hair as he gestured wildly from his position on the floor, between her legs as she sat on his couch during her visits. She gave the kinds of hugs that could heal a broken heart, stop tears in their tracks… Lance remembers the day he confessed to her clear as day; The way the Altean would squeeze his arms softly, her manicured fingers both gentle and firm... grounding, in the way he has known Allura to be. 

Shiro often expressed his love through his constant words of encouragement, and Coran would phone in every other night to recount his newest adventures to the pair, and Keith…

Keith had a funny way with love. 

It bloomed inside of him. Day by day, it grew— blossomed— encouraged by patience and _lots_ of reception of the love Lance himself gave. Being with Keith and learning how he loved was slow, steady, gradual— the growth of which it reaches only noticeable in its vastness if it were to somehow be measurable in time lapse.

But it was there in the beginning, and it was there now; and actions always did seem to speak louder than words for Keith. Casual kisses to Lance’s temple as he’d pass him sitting at their dining room with his favorite chipped mug, barely stopping on his trek to the coffee machine to claim his own cup for the morning. Chaste kisses to the crown of his head as they sat out at their balcony, draped in blankets and incorrectly naming constellations with too much confidence for men who’ve been among them.

Butterfly kisses in the early dawn, when Keith knows Lance has a morning class to teach and refuses to wake him any other way than with gentle pecks to his nose, his eyelids, his chin— until Lance becomes a giggling mess and the play fighting that always ensues leads to one of them being pushed from off the bed. 

And it all took some time, like most good things do. Maybe that’s why it all felt so good; having the Universe’s favorite warrior— the galaxies star protege- _finally_ looking at him. _Seeing_ him. 

Or maybe, Lance pondered, as he traveled up the final flight of stairs leading to his and his aforementioned boyfriend’s seventh floor apartment, pushing off each step with a _little_ more effort than he had needed to during his run as the Blue Paladin, much to his dismay;

Maybe it was because, somewhere along the road to rebuilding earth, annihilating any last trace of threat-- galra or otherwise-- Keith had gone from loving him, to being _in love_ with him.  
And despite feeling like there were things unsaid between them-- conflicts left unconfronted, concerns unaddressed, emotions and thoughts communicated cryptically instead of through words-- Lance knew he was in love with the Red paladin too.

Sometimes he worried he loved Keith more than Keith loved him. 

Shaking that _untrue and uncalled for_ train of thought from his mind, and spotting the little white wooden door with their apartment number at eye level -- 710 -- he picks up his pace, stopping in front of the iron numbers nailed to his door, digging into his back pocket for his key lanyard, swinging it in circles around his index finger as he turns the knob, strolls into his entryway and--

Comes face to face-- or face to flower? _Flowers?_ \-- with what seemed to be over four dozen bright, brilliant yellow sunflowers stuffed in a random assortment of $.99 vases Lance vaguely remembers buying in a ridiculous Pier1 spring sale, with Keith,

Who was standing in their little kitchenette, five more stems in his left hand and _another_ vase in their sink, filling with tap water. 

Lance is…. Lance, having no idea what the flowers were for, where they came from, or why there were so _many_ , stood still as a statue in the mudroom walkway. 

The flowers were…. Breathtaking. The yellow petals seemed to reach the length of Lance’s thumb, and they crowned fat disk florets that Lance didn’t even have to peel back to know healthy and large seeds grew behind them. Each green stem was at least an inch thick in girth, and the waxy exterior gleamed with the water Keith must have run them under to get rid of bugs. The leaves had been removed from the body of the stem, and five or six flowers each sat in the green and yellow and blue and white vases. 

Sunflowers were his favorite. 

“You’re home!” Keith exclaims, startling Lance from the trance he never realize had taken over him. Whipping his head to face the man behind the voice, Lance is almost taken aback by the bright smile he’s wearing. 

And that dimple… that endearing little dimple.

It’s almost as distracting as the 50-something bright yellow blossoms that litter his dining table.

“I was at the farmer’s market with Shiro this afternoon,” Keith rounded the counter to meet Lance where he stood, one arm resting against one of the chairs, the other coming up to trace one of the delicate yellow crescents. He sets down the final vase on the wooden surface to join the others. 

“There were so many flowers, Lance! I have to take you next time. Everyone is super conversational too. Almost every booth we visited talked us up big time,” he settled his now flower-free hand at the bend of Lance’s waist. “Your kind of people, you know?”

The other man can’t seem to form words, shaking his head silently and joining his eyebrows above his nose in complete confusion-- in utter bafflement. 

“What-- what are these-- who are these--” 

“There for you.”

“They’re for _me_?”

And Lance doesn’t mean to sound as surprised as he does-- he really, truly doesn’t-- but never in his life had he received so many flowers; maybe a sad little carnation during Valentine’s day, and the bouquet of roses his mama brought him when he graduated from the Garrison the year after he and the other Defenders of the Universe had finished their higher responsibilities-- but never a tabletop full of sunflowers… giant, glorious, almost too big and perfect and symmetrical and so, so so _yellow_ —like the only sun that ever meant anything to Lance during all his time in space- to be true. 

But they were for him. And Keith, judging by the way he crosses his arms against his chest and furrows his dark eyebrows, eyes cast down-- doesn’t seem to like the fact that Lance would be so surprised.

He quickly goes to cushion the blow. “I mean-- Keith, hey-- mi tesoro, please look at me? I just thought they were like, for a wedding or something! No one has ever gotten me five dozen sunflowers before. You have to cut me some slack!”

A beat, then Keith speaks. “They reminded me of you.” He replies quietly, eyes never leaving Lance’s, even as the hand that turned his face so he would look at the other drops to his shoulder. “I saw them, in this little wooden cart, off to the side of a flower vendor’s rose display-- and Shiro said I should get you a rose or something, a little remembrance,” his arms slowly begin to encircle his boyfriend’s waist, pulling him towards himself just enough that Lance can put both hands on his broad shoulders. He thanks the stars— because once upon a time, Keith used to close in on himself. 

He used to hunch his shoulders, lock his arms over his chest, and remove himself from any situation that left him feeling small— and if someone would bring attention to it, he wouldn’t be able to contain his defensive outburst. 

As strong hands squeezes his hips, Lance can’t help but smile at the thought of _just how far they have come_. As soldiers. As people. As two boys so in love it was ridiculous. 

Another squeeze- harder this time, and Lance knew what it meant; Keith was building up the courage to say something. 

And Lance is by no means a slacker when it comes to his physical fitness; volleyball every other morning, and a nightly jog a few hours before bed kept him in shape, and though he may not be as lean and his muscles may not be as fluid as they were before he became a teacher at the Garrison, Keith still went on ten mile runs with his older brother every saturday morning. Still sparred at their local gym, and even began teaching taekwondo during Monday and Wednesday nights at the dojo a few miles east of their complex. If anything, he would have the opposite problem of Lance, should they ever need to slap on their old armor. 

But he used that strength now to carry Lance on his back during late night jogs together, after he would dramatically declare he could _no longer take another step, McMullet_. Used it to haul the excess of groceries Lance couldn’t help but buy up the unforgiving seven flights of stairs to their little home, not complaining once as plastic bags draped over his forearms would stretch and bite into his skin. He’d use it to squeeze, and squeeze and squeeze whenever he needed to remember Lance was there. That he’d never leave.

“But I saw these,” he says, motioning with one hand to the scattered vases among their table, “And I immediately thought of you. How bright you are, how you can draw the eyes of anyone from across the room. How obnoxious you are-”

“Hey-”

“And how beautiful. How so, _so_ beautiful you are to me, my angel.” To prove his point further, Keith picks up a stem from the closest vase, holding it horizontally so it was parallel to the floor, the head of the flower facing upwards. “You have strong roots, and a strong foundation,” Keith traces his hand up the thick stem, still glimmering from the water in the vase. “You have all these wonderful hidden quirks, and talents, and a bunch of smart ideas, and advice that you can give others-” He runs his finger over the disk florets, removing them and exposing the black seeds within the head. “And you help people grow because of these things.”

The heart within Lance’s ribcage beats at supersonic speed- or stops beating entirely. He couldn’t tell you; _waaaaaaaaaay_ too busy in the moment.

All he can say, in a voice even softer than that of the man who stood in front of him, is, “Wow.”

Keith chuckles. “Yeah, ‘wow’.” Lifting his hand, he gently brushes the hair handing over Lance’s ear, tucking it behind its shell. “My sentiments exactly, every time I get to see you smile.”

And smile he does. Overwhelmed with emotion and gratitude and love and _something_ \-- something deep and intense and begging to be expressed-- Lance wraps his arms around his boyfriend’s waist, bending his knees and hauling him off the ground with a giggle that only grows louder at Keith’s surprised (perhaps slightly impressed?) squawk. 

“I bet you didn’t even know they’re my favorite.” He smiles against Keith’s shoulder once he’s settled back on his own feet. Hands quickly brace his shoulders and push him away so he’s face-to-face once again with piercing blue eyes wide with disbelief. “Really?”

“Really!”

“Well, I didn’t… does that make me lucky,” he whispers, eyes downcast towards Lance’s parted lips, before looking up into flustered blue eyes and smirking. “or just a really good boyfriend?”

Allowing a slow smile to spread amongst his own lips, Lance settles one hand at the nape of Keith’s neck, running his fingers through the dark hair settled there and massaging. “Maybe a little bit of both.”

Keith’s eyes return to gaze at that breathtaking smile. “ _Wow_.”


End file.
